Search results for "801"
showing 10 items of 1684 documents
Estimating willingness to pay for desalinated seawater: the case of Djerba Island, Tunisia
2017
AbstractWater scarcity can be a growth-limiting factor. Non-conventional water resources, such as desalinated water, represent an alternative means of guaranteeing access to water while reducing water stress. In this study, a contingent valuation survey carried out in Djerba Island, Tunisia, allows the joint modelling of two decisions: societal support for the construction of a desalination plant and households’ willingness to pay for desalinated water. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no study to date has addressed this relationship. We find that although a clear majority of households are in favour of using desalinated water, far fewer are willing to pay for it. The article conclude…
A Short-Term Data Based Water Consumption Prediction Approach
2019
A smart water network consists of a large number of devices that measure a wide range of parameters present in distribution networks in an automatic and continuous way. Among these data, you can find the flow, pressure, or totalizer measurements that, when processed with appropriate algorithms, allow for leakage detection at an early stage. These algorithms are mainly based on water demand forecasting. Different approaches for the prediction of water demand are available in the literature. Although they present successful results at different levels, they have two main drawbacks: the inclusion of several seasonalities is quite cumbersome, and the fitting horizons are not very large. With th…
Identification of Potential Locations for Run-of-River Hydropower Plants Using a GIS-Based Procedure
2019
The increasing demand for renewable and sustainable energy sources has encouraged the development of small run-of-river plants. Preliminary studies are required to assess the technical and economic feasibility of such plants. In this context, the identification of optimal potential run-of-river sites has become a key issue. In this paper, an approach that is based on GIS tools coupled with a hydrological model has been applied to detect potential locations for a run-of-river plant. A great number of locations has been analyzed to identify those that could assure the achievement of different thresholds of potential power. The environmental and economic feasibility for small hydropower projec…
The onset of convection in a two-layered porous medium with anisotropic permeability
2019
We consider convection in a horizontal porous layer of uniform thickness which is heated from below and which is composed of two anisotropic sublayers with principal axes lying in the three coordinate directions. The aim is to determine criteria for the onset of convection by finding the critical Rayleigh number, wavenumber and roll orientation relative to the coordinate axes. The full set of nondimensional parameters has at least six members even when the sublayers are considered to be thermally isotropic, and therefore, we select some special cases in order to illuminate the type of qualitative behaviour which may be expected. One such case is where the anisotropic sublayers are identical…
Insights into the summer diurnal cycle over Eastern South Africa.
2018
Abstract Adopting a state-of-the-art numerical model system, we investigate how the diurnal variations in precipitation and local breeze systems are characterized by lower-boundary conditions related to the Drakensberg highland and warm SST associated with the Agulhas Current. A control simulation can simulate the hydrometeorological climates in the region realistically, but the terrestrial rainfall is overestimated. During daytime, the precipitation is confined to the Drakensberg highland, and there is an onshore local breeze, while during midnight to morning, the rainfall is confined to the Agulhas Current, and the breeze is offshore. These variations are captured by the numerical simulat…
Learning from Social Collaboration
2017
This chapter focuses on the challenge of evaluating game-based learning. It argues that linking game-based learning with the characteristics of a specific game or game-produced engagement is challenging. It further proposes a framework in which the game-based learning process is approached by considering (business) simulation games as Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) environments and presents an approach on how learning can be approached and evaluated from this perspective. In addition, it highlights how simulation game mechanics appears to be a potential way to promote learners' socio-emotional processes and give rise to social interaction and to structure collaboration amo…
Multi-user interference mitigation under limited feedback requirements for WCDMA systems with base station cooperation
2016
One of the techniques that has been recently identified for dealing with multi-user interference (MUI) in future communications systems is base station (BS) cooperation or joint processing. However, perfect MUI cancellation with this technique demands severe synchronization requirements, perfect and global channel state information (CSI), and an increased backhaul and signaling overhead. In this paper, we consider a more realistic layout with the aim of mitigating the MUI, where only local CSI is available at the BSs. Due to synchronization inaccuracies and errors in the channel estimation, the system becomes partially asynchronous. In the downlink of wideband code division multiple access …
Communicating with home, coping without home – Trusting to the mediating capacity of blogging
2021
Abstract In the early 21st century, blogs exploded onto the digital media scene and soon became a popular means of travel writing. However, rather than considering blogs as a straightforward tool to simply share stories and experiences, in this article, we set out to explore the role of blogs as a mediating technology (Verbeek, 2005a), especially during difficult times abroad. By analysing the blogs of expatriate Australians who were volunteers in Bangladesh in 2014/2015 as well as interviews with the bloggers, we are able to show how the blogs' affordances inform the coping process, highlighted, in particular, in an active and highly reflective engagement with the blog's unique situatednes…
Making Communication Strategy Choices in a Fast Evolving Crisis Situation—Results from a Table-Top Discussion on an Anthrax Scenario
2016
This paper aims at clarifying a timely topic of how communication strategy choices are made in evolving, complex crises, such as those caused by terrorism involving chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear (CBRN) agents. This is done by examining data gathered from a table-top discussion among crisis communication experts, focusing on a scenario of an anthrax attack and analysed qualitatively. The communication experts followed the evolving crisis situation by gathering inputs from various actors in the crisis management network, thereby creating situational understanding, and interpreted these inputs for decision-making on communication strategies. The underlying process of coping wi…
Media for Coping During COVID-19 Social Distancing: Stress, Anxiety, and Psychological Well-Being.
2020
In spring 2020, COVID-19 and the ensuing social distancing and stay-at-home orders instigated abrupt changes to employment and educational infrastructure, leading to uncertainty, concern, and stress among United States college students. The media consumption patterns of this and other social groups across the globe were affected, with early evidence suggesting viewers were seeking both pandemic-themed media and reassuring, familiar content. A general increase in media consumption, and increased consumption of specific types of content, may have been due to media use for coping strategies. This paper examines the relationship between the stress and anxiety of university students and their st…